Refugees
Suffering
Sacrifice
Letting go
Human dignity
Freedom
Brave New World
Memories of WWII
Survival
Beginnings
Life is discovered in a desperate situation
World wakes up from slumber
Heartbreaking nightmare
Humans help humans
Courage
Gratitude
Safety
After Nam I spent a month with my family, did the DOD School and went to Germany to finish my military time.
My sister, Martha Ann, 13, developed a cold that winter. My father wrote letters about her condition. Her energy dropped. She became weak. He took her to doctors for a diagnosis.
She had a rare form of AML leukemia and started chemotherapy. She needed bone marrow transplants in her short future. The prognosis was maybe five years for a complete remission.
She prospered in school and Girl Scouts with a positive mental attitude.
Neighbors had horses and she formed a loving relationship with them.
Her long blond hair flies in wind. She embodies a strong discipline in the saddle. Her back is straight. Approaching a jump over an abyss, fear is defeated by her courage.
She leaves the stable leading a Palomino. She wears tall black boots, riding pants, and a stiff white shirt buttoned at her frail neck. Only I know she is sick and dying. It is our secret. She smiles at me.
She whispers magic words and you know by the animal’s response they love and trust each other. She rides in green pastures under a bright blue sky. Her face is serene.
Her sickness was a long slow meandering journey. She maintained her optimism, smiling, laughing, and doing excellent in school. She knew she was sick. She was a warrior girl child.
Horses gave her freedom and passion. She rode every day after school. Weekends were cleaning, grooming, laughing and loving her relationships.
She had a clear spirit. No fear.
Her pain was a sickness leaving her fragile body.
Doctors tried every experimental drug on the market. Drugs made her long blond hair fall out. She wore a wig. She tolerated inane questions and insinuative cruel bullying from classmates. She maintained her dignity and integrity.
“Dad, what happens when they run out of experimental drugs?” she asked at dinner. He had no answer.
The broken-hearted man brought his daughter home from Children’s Hospital in Denver for her last Christmas. She enjoyed snow, a warm fire, magic tree, cats, presents and love.
Her heart gave out three days after Christmas, 1972.
I received the expected phone call at the Kassel Field Station.
“Martha is gone,” said my father’s cracking voice.
“What happened?”
“I went to the hospital on my lunch hour and she was lying there and she looked so beautiful yet so weak and she said, ‘Dad, hold me, I’m going to faint,’ and I did and then her heart stopped. It just wore her out.”
I cried, “I’m so sorry dad. I’ll get a flight out.”
“You will always remember her as a happy little girl.”
Angels and peace welcomed Martha Ann.
She never saw fourteen of anything. She never went to high school or college, fell in love, worked, lived, laughed, traveled, explored future worlds or experienced a longer life with her vibrant trembling spirit.
Her existence was all wrapped up in one tight package with an expiration date.
Cold winter was her refuge and now.
Her childlike joy and spirit energies soared away from her labyrinth. She evolved on her path of light, love, and perfection. No longer a human on a spiritual path she was a spiritual being on a human path.
On her brief sojourn before crossing time’s river she demonstrated tolerance, integrity, kindness, tranquility, dignity, empathy and truth.
Martha Ann validated her authenticity. She hurled her thunderbolt.
Burma
After Nam I spent a month with my family, did the DOD School and went to Germany to finish my military time.
My sister, Martha Ann, 13, developed a cold that winter. My father wrote letters about her condition. Her energy dropped. She became weak. He took her to doctors for a diagnosis.
She had a rare form of AML leukemia and started chemotherapy. She needed bone marrow transplants in her short future. The prognosis was maybe five years for a complete remission.
She prospered in school and Girl Scouts with a positive mental attitude.
Neighbors had horses and she formed a loving relationship with them.
Her long blond hair flies in wind. She embodies a strong discipline in the saddle. Her back is straight. Approaching a jump over an abyss, fear is defeated by her courage.
She leaves the stable leading a Palomino. She wears tall black boots, riding pants, and a stiff white shirt buttoned at her frail neck. Only I know she is sick and dying. It is our secret. She smiles at me.
She whispers magic words and you know by the animal’s response they love and trust each other. She rides in green pastures under a bright blue sky. Her face is serene.
Her sickness was a long slow meandering journey. She maintained her optimism, smiling, laughing, and doing excellent in school. She knew she was sick. She was a warrior girl child.
Horses gave her freedom and passion. She rode every day after school. Weekends were cleaning, grooming, laughing and loving her relationships.
Her spirit is clear. She has no fear.
Her pain was a sickness leaving her fragile body.
Doctors tried every experimental drug on the market. Drugs made her long blond hair fall out. She wore a wig. She tolerated inane questions and insinuative cruel bullying from classmates. She maintained her dignity and integrity.
“Dad, what happens when they run out of experimental drugs?” she asked at dinner. He had no answer.
The broken-hearted man brought his daughter home from Children’s Hospital in Denver for her last Christmas. She enjoyed snow, a warm fire, magic tree, cats, presents and love.
Her heart gave out three days after Christmas, 1972.
I received the expected phone call at the Kassel Field Station.
“Martha is gone,” said my father’s cracking voice.
“What happened?”
“I went to the hospital on my lunch hour and she was lying there and she looked so beautiful yet so weak and she said, ‘Dad, hold me, I’m going to faint,’ and I did and then her heart stopped. It just wore her out.”
I cried, “I’m so sorry dad. I’ll get a flight out.”
“You will always remember her as a happy little girl.”
Angels and peace welcomed Martha Ann. She never saw fourteen of anything. She never went to high school or college, fell in love, worked, lived, laughed, traveled, explored future worlds or experienced a longer life with her vibrant trembling spirit. Her existence was all wrapped up in one tight package with an expiration date.
Cold winter was her refuge and now.
Her childlike joy and spirit energies soared away from her labyrinth. She evolved on her path of light, love, and perfection. No longer a human on a spiritual path she was a spiritual being on a human path.
On her brief sojourn before crossing time’s river she demonstrated tolerance, integrity, kindness, tranquility, dignity, empathy and truth. Martha Ann validated her authenticity. She hurled her thunderbolt.
Mai's hearing evaluation.
Anthony from NZ came, he met, he talked, he promised, he took her out, he tried to seduce her, he failed, he left. Mai is resigned to her former life, massage and laundry scrubbing under the paternal gaze of her older sister who sits in perpetual admiration of her mirrored reflection.
How does her awareness and disappointment register in her POTENTIAL for unrealized dreams?
How does her silent resignation and understanding comprehend lost chance, all the complexity w/o expectations?
Even in the false dream of star rain they had to move a wooden toy pawn, the salad bar in silence welcomed cool air from a brown river, children pressed noses to a rolling window, laughing.
An archeologist skips through star puddles into 8th Century excavations.
Freedom sings stones, selling a Blue Pumpkin to a Cambodian land mine amputee w/o a left leg selling DVDs to fat tourists talking with their mouths full.
An Enfield rumbles in Pokhara spinning the Wheel of Time, rejoicing in miracles, small ones.
Sit in meditation.
We do laundry by machine, said Language Animal.
3.8 billion years ago a black hole captured a star the size of our sun. It sucked the star into its empty mass. The star exploded the black hole. The escaping energy created, released streams of light we see today.
At that moment 20 raindrops trusted intuition.
To travel is to feel.
Indonesia asked you to return. Two years ago you said thank you. Goodbye to all that.
Orchids remember you.
The apple tree you planted at Gardenia is growing. Roots buried deep below blossoms lie fragrant with memory.
In and out dialogue.
Discover what speaks to you.
keep doing what you are doing
i won't be here long
ink dances with dust
deep craggy sunken brown face
opium addict wears old green pathet lao army pants
a plastic string belt
threadbare patched jacket
sandals
lint in his pocket
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